Courageous Persistence

In an anniversary year, we celebrate women's running pioneers

Between April and June 1972, 40 years ago, women were first able to officially run the Boston Marathon, the New York Women's Mini was created, and Title IX of the Educational Amendments of 1972 became law. "No person in the United States shall, on the basis of sex, be excluded from participation in . . . any educational program or activity receiving Federal assistance." From that legal prose, aimed primarily at academic programs, but applying inescapably to high school and college sports, every woman and every woman runner in America now younger than age 60 has benefited.

And on October 1, 1972, the six women entrants in the New York City Marathon staged a protest sit-down for 10 minutes at the start so they could race on equal terms with the men.

It has been revealing to meet these pioneers, women of courageous persistence, who above all simply loved to run and sought opportunity to race longer distances.

Some, by necessity, became activists. Nina Kuscsik (far left in photo), a champion roller-skater, ice-skater and road cyclist before she discovered running in 1969, became a delegate to the Amateur Athletics Union (AAU) convention, and she introduced amendments to the rules restricting women to races not longer than 2 miles and prohibiting competition with men.

"The AAU convention finally allowed us to race up to 10 miles, but we had to have a separate starting line. So we drew a 'separate' line on the sidewalk alongside the men," Kuscsik recounted at the Boston Marathon's celebration of 40 years of women last April. When the New York City Marathon compelled the women to start 10 minutes ahead of the men, it provoked the sit-down and subsequent legal action against the AAU for discrimination.

We should not rush to condemn. In 1972 it was still widely believed that long-distance racing was potentially dangerous, and many marathons enforced a pre-race medical examination. The full story of the controversy reveals that outside the AAU, male runners generally encouraged women who shared their love of running. Jock Semple's infamous fiery defensiveness was not representative, even at Boston.

"The Boston A.A. welcomed women as soon as they were permitted by the AAU," said Sara Mae Berman (far right), unofficial Boston winner in 1969, '70 and '71, in April. "They immediately provided equal prizes. The B.A.A. set the standard." On the West Coast, correspondence to the Northern California Running Review during 1971 showed a range of opinion that prompted a special committee to be established in San Francisco to "discuss" long-distance running for women.

That grass-roots source material reached me courtesy of Jacki Dixon, who as a 17-year-old track and cross country runner with the "San Jose Cindergals" had her expenses paid by the San Francisco Examiner for the new women's 6-mile (later 10K) road race in New York, the "Mini-Marathon." She won it.

"There were no races longer than a mile on the track, so sometimes I entered road races as Jack Dixon, so I could get a number and therefore a time. Nobody ever gave me a hard time," recalls Dixon, an honored guest at this June's Mini.

Valerie Rogosheske, one of the eight women who ran Boston in 1972, told a similar story from Minnesota.

"I ran road races as the only woman, and I would ask afterward if they could have a women's award the next year. 'Oh, I never thought of that,' the guy would say, and he would mail me an award a week later."

It's hard now to imagine an era when information was so limited, and road running so miniscule.

"When I started running, the Boston Marathon was the only road race I'd ever heard of," Rogosheske says.

Where opportunity existed, a few stalwart women made use of it. In Christchurch, New Zealand, Diane Dixey first ran the local road ultra, the New Brighton 50-miles, in 1968, with (after a debate) official sanction.

Running in those days mostly meant track and cross country, with a few eccentrics pursuing their dream in the marathon.

"My coach gave me a killer workout the day before I ran the New York Mini. He didn't take a road race seriously. But I was known as 'the horse' because of my mileage workload, and the Mini was the only time my type of endurance running was acknowledged," Dixon says.

The Mini's media profile, sponsorship and 6-mile distance made it an important part of the history. Dixon also recalls a women's 2.5-mile road race in Reedley, Calif., in 1971: "Francie Larrieu beat me by one yard." Championship road races for women, usually 2 to 3 miles, were on the New Zealand schedule from the mid-1960s. Britain held women's road relay championships from 1963, but it took longer for straight road races.

It was becoming official in the marathon, with its aura of extreme effort and heroic endurance, that sealed the American women's breakthrough to running equality.

In Boston last April, Kathrine Switzer (second from left)–the first woman to wear a number in Boston, and coincidentally, my wife–said, "When we were made official at Boston, there was an unspoken understanding among us that we had to finish, and with dignity and strength. At last we were running as athletes, instead of carrying a banner for the whole female sex."